What Do I Tell My Children

[thestoryteller]

WHAT DO I TELL MY CHILDREN?

If you've lived in outback Queensland just as I have,
you must've faced at times the scourge of drought.
You'd have watched the senseless dying of your livestock
and felt completely drained and numb no doubt.
Did you ponder on why life can bring such sorrow,
when other times you’re dealt a joyful hand?
Though the bitterest of blows is when the children
express, "Dear Daddy, we don't understand."

How I hate to see the hurt upon their faces,
but more so when they give your hand a squeeze
and the question that forever haunts my thinking,
"What do I tell my children? Tell me, please!"

Then one balmy morn way back there in September,
my children settled down upon the floor,
as they planned to watch play school on television,
but little did we know what was in store.
How they sat perplexed at seeing the explosions
of buildings there upon the tele screen
and the aftermath then left the children reeling -
left wond'ring at the images they'd seen.

Though I sensed the children's minds took on the notion,
that things they viewed were happening overseas,
how that question still forever haunts my thinking,
"What do I tell my children? Tell me, please!"

Hosts of men, who searched the mountainous piles of rubble,
live vividly within each young child's mind,
plus the endless walls of pictures of lost loved ones,
placed there by anxious folk now left behind.
In their classrooms children talk about the horror
and can man stop the threat of war somehow?
Though our home is miles away from New York City,

As my children leave the light on in their bedrooms,
lock windows which exclude a nightly breeze,
yes, that question still forever haunts my thinking,
"What do I tell my children? Tell me, please!"

We had planned to fly the children to their grandma’s,
who lives just north of Brisbane on the coast,
but the thought of going on a 'plane is not on,
as flying is the thing they fear the most.
So as parents we have organised this summer,
a camping trip with some of their close friends,
but I fear the world will never be the same place,
though live in hope the terrorism ends.

All I wish is for my children to be happy,
that innocent young minds can be at ease.
Though that question still forever haunts my thinking,
"What do I tell my children? Tell me, please!"


©Merv Webster

From the book Keeping the Culture

September 11th will forever be a dark day in the history of mankind, as it affected people of all ages around the world, including outback Queensland. The above poem received a highly commended award at the Blackened Billy written competition at the Tamworth Country Music Festival in 2002 and 3rd place at the Australian Bush Poetry Championships in the written section for serious verse.